Category: Playlist

Monday Wake Up Call – February 28, 2022

The Daily Escape:

Wiggly Bridge, York, ME – February 2022 photo by Eric Storm Photo

Wrongo intended to write about domestic issues today. One domestic issue is how Republicans and the Right-wing media pivoted over the weekend from being pro-Putin and his War, to now saying Russia was wrong to invade Ukraine. Is that proof that the sanctions are working?

It’s hard to turn away today from Ukraine news, despite knowing that Biden’s State of the Union (SOTU) speech is tomorrow night. The Republican reply will be given by Iowa’s Governor Kim Reynolds. This happens at a time when there are big differences of opinion about the most important issues facing the nation by Democrats and Republicans.

According to a Pew Research Center survey, 71% of US adults rated strengthening the economy as a top policy priority, followed by reducing health care costs (61%), addressing the coronavirus (60%), improving education (58%) and securing Social Security (57%). The survey was conducted between Jan. 10-17, 2022 among 5,128 adults.

But as expected, the top issues were very different for those who identified as a Republican or as a Democrat. When asked which issues “should be a top priority for the president and Congress to address this year,” the top five regarded as most important by Democrats were:

Top 5 priorities, according to Democrats (percent saying issue should be a top priority)

  1. Dealing with the coronavirus outbreak (80%)
  2. Reducing health care costs (69%)
  3. Improving the educational system (66%)
  4. Dealing with global climate change (65%)
  5. Strengthening the nation’s economy (63%)

Here’s the Republicans’ top-five list:

Top 5 priorities, according to Republicans (percent saying issue should be a top priority)

  1. Strengthening the nation’s economy (82%)
  2. Dealing with the issue of immigration (67%)
  3. Defending the country from future terrorist attacks (65%)
  4. Reducing the budget deficit (63%)
  5. Reducing crime (60%)

Strengthening the nation’s economy is the only priority that both Democrats and Republicans rank among the most important. Two of the Democrats’ top priorities are among the five lowest-priority issues for Republicans. Only 11% of Republicans think global climate change should be a priority (vs. 65% of Democrats). Just 35% of Republicans think dealing with the coronavirus outbreak should be a priority (vs. 80% of Democrats).

Conversely, two of the Republicans’ top priorities are among the five lowest-priority issues for Democrats. Only 35% of Democrats think immigration should be a priority (vs. 67% of Republicans). Just 31% of Democrats say the budget deficit should be a priority (vs. 63% of Republicans).

All of this may be on display at the SOTU and the Republican reply on Tuesday.

Returning to Ukraine, it’s reported that Ukraine and Russia have agreed to have low-level delegations meet, hosted by Belarus, to discuss ending the war. It’s unclear what exactly might be achieved from these negotiations, given that Putin’s War appears to be aimed largely at removing Zelensky from power.

Finally, assuming that Russia wins either on the battlefield or at the negotiating table, that will almost certainly be followed by a Ukrainian insurgency supported by NATO. The US military knows a lot about how many troops it takes to hold ground when most of the locals want you dead.

Many military studies say that the number needed is 10 troops to one insurgent. From The Dupuy Institute (TDI): (Brackets by Wrongo)

“…TDI amassed data on 109 post-World War II insurgencies, interventions, and peacekeeping operations between 2004 and 2009. [TDI]…found that….While overwhelming numbers were not required to defeat an insurgency, force ratios above 10-to-1 nearly always produced a counterinsurgent victory. Conversely, lower force ratios did not preclude success, but conflicts with two or fewer counterinsurgents per insurgent greatly favored an insurgent victory.”

Remember in this case the insurgents would be Ukrainians, and counterinsurgents the Russians. More from TDI:

“When force ratios were assessed together with the nature of the motivation for the insurgency, TDI found that….when facing broadly popular insurgencies, counterinsurgents lost every time they possessed a force ratio advantage of 5-1 or less, failed half the time with odds between 6-1 and 10-1, but succeeded three-quarters of the time when outnumbering the insurgents by 10-1 or more.”

Ukraine’s pre-war population was 44 million. Let’s assume that 20% would support an insurgency, and that 2% would participate in an insurgency. That would be 176k Ukrainian insurgents. Following the 10-1 ratio would mean Russia would need to keep 1.76 million troops on the ground to win, an unsupportable number. Cutting the number of insurgents in half would mean Russia would need 880k troops to occupy Ukraine, still an unsupportable number.

This could mean that an insurgency in Ukraine could succeed as easily as it did in Afghanistan.

Time to wake up Putin! You might win before you lose in Ukraine. To help you wake up, watch the Saturday Night Live open, where the Ukrainian Chorus Dumka of New York performed “Prayer for Ukraine”:

Kinda makes you tear up.

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Saturday Soother – February 26, 2022

The Daily Escape:

Sedona, AZ dusted in snow- February 2022 photo by Valentina Tree

Late on Friday, the US, Britain and EU said they will sanction Russian President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. This is the third round of Biden’s sanctions, and blocks the Russian president from any economic activity within the American financial system. White House press secretary Jen Psaki indicated the US would also implement a travel ban for Putin.

These sanctions effectively place Putin in the same category as North Korea’s Kim Jong Un.

As with other Russian sanctions, it isn’t clear how effective the Putin asset freeze will be. According to the Pandora Papers investigation, Putin appears to control assets in Europe, but the amounts are trivial compared to estimates of his wealth. The travel ban is significant. It says that the West considers Putin to be an international pariah. Earlier, Biden also announced a second round of sanctions against Russia.

The challenge facing Biden is how to avoid either starting or losing, a World War. He’s done a decent job rallying other nations towards a common viewpoint about Putin’s War. Putin believed he could at least neutralize certain allies within both NATO and Europe, along with some politicians and the public in a few EU countries.

But thus far, Biden’s had success at undercutting Russia’s efforts. He has been able to achieve broad unity by making it clear that Russia is an unprovoked aggressor. Yet Kyiv may soon fall to the Russian invaders. Addressing his nation, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky said the Russians are coming after him specifically:

“The enemy has marked me as enemy number one.”

He told EU leaders on a Thursday night zoom call that “this might be the last time you see me alive“.

We can’t ignore what’s happening, but the US won’t risk all-out war over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. We hope to avoid these choices by imposing sanctions that might turn the Russian people against Putin, by depriving Russia of cash and other resources. The sanctions are impressively multilateral.

However, the new sanctions have some loopholes. Adam Tooze reports that the sanctions specifically exclude energy: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“Energy is the really critical issue in the sanctions saga for both sides. It is what will hurt Russia most. It is also what is most critical for Europe. And, on energy… Biden…made this aside:

‘You know, in our sanctions package, we specifically designed to allow energy payments to continue.’”

Really Joe? The sanctions say that as long as your energy-related transactions are channeled through non-sanctioned, non-US financial institutions, for instance a European bank, buying gas from Russia is peachy. So, all of the payments for Russian gas will be paid free of problems for as long as sanctions are in place.

The political pressure for an energy carve-out comes from Germany. Bloomberg reported earlier:

“The German government has pushed for an exemption for the energy sector if there is a move to block Russian banks from clearing US dollar transactions….other major western European nations hold similar views.”

It gets worse. The carve-out isn’t limited to energy, it also applies to Russia’s agricultural commodity exports. So long as those transactions run through non-US, non-sanctioned banks, the US sanctions will not apply.

This shows how dependent our European partners are on Russia for gas and agriculture. It also shows how hollow the sanctions are, and how they will not be the “punishing” sanctions Biden promised.

It’s useful to remember that Germany’s use of Russian gas has been a completely tenable and a mutually beneficial relationship for 40+ years.

Finally, Biden didn’t announce excluding Russia from the SWIFT global financial payments system because Italy, Germany, and Cyprus weren’t willing to do it. Part of this has to do with buying Russian gas. It also has to do with how dependent their economies are on exports to Russia. Although, as Biden noted, full blocking of Russian financial institutions should achieve the same, or even greater, effect as a SWIFT ban.

Except for that gas and agriculture thingy, so not the same at all.

The question is whether the EU and NATO are truly willing to bear the costs of inflicting pain on Russia in order to end the Russian invasion of Ukraine. As of today, it seems that they are not.

Time to take a break from geopolitics and whether Lindsay Graham will support Biden’s new Supreme Court nominee, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson. It’s time for our Saturday Soother, where we turn away from the news and focus on trying to calm the f down.

Today is a typical winter day in Connecticut. It’s chilly and there’s snow on the ground, but far less than predicted.

Since Putin is acting like the Honey Badger, let’s start by upping your honey badger game by brewing a mug of Honey Badger Espresso from Intelligentsia Coffee. They’re a Chicago-based chain with locations in Chicago, Los Angeles, Austin, Boston, and NYC. Leave the intelligentsia and take the honey badger.

Now grab a seat by a window and listen to Handel’s “Ombra mai fu”, known as Handel’s Largo of Love, it’s the opening aria in the 1738 opera Xerxes. Here it is performed in 2017 by  Czechoslovakia’s Janacek Chamber Orchestra with soloist soprano Patricia Janečková:

Beautiful voice!

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Putin’s War

The Daily Escape:

Rio Grande, near Taos, NM – February 2022 photo by Augustine Morgan

“God created war so that Americans would learn geography” ― Mark Twain

Yesterday we woke up to a new world order created by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Details are still sketchy, but it seems that Russia attacked from the north, east and south. Cruise missiles hit targets even in western Ukraine. The NYT provided this early map of reported Russian attacks:

The shaded areas on the right are Donetsk and Luhansk, the Ukrainian provinces that Russia recognized a few days ago as independent republics. The smaller area inside is the area currently controlled by the Russian separatists.

This news and Putin’s kabuki play leading up to the invasion obscures the fact that we’re now seeing the revival of war as an instrument of statecraft. History shows that wars of conquest used to be common. In the 19th century, that’s what strong states did to their weak neighbors. Since the mid-20th century, wars of conquest are the exception not the rule. Russia has now brought wars of conquest back on the geopolitical stage.

Putin’s attack has the goal of regime change, plus the annexation of the breakaway provinces. While NATO and the US seem to have no real countermeasures, other than sanctions. That demonstrates another of Russia’s goals: exposing NATO’s impotence.

NATO’s late-stage impotence has many causes.

The collective defense provisions of Article 5 of the NATO Charter has held the alliance together. It provides that if a NATO ally is attacked, all members of the Alliance will consider it an armed attack against them and take action to assist the attacked ally.

For much of the Cold War, (including when Wrongo served in Europe) NATO had a standing army prepared to deter an attack by the Soviets and/or its Warsaw Pact allies. NATO also maintained significant air and naval forces to confront Soviet aggression. NATO’s forces were anchored by a massive US military presence in Europe, including hundreds of thousands of troops, tens of thousands of armored vehicles, thousands of combat aircraft, and hundreds of naval vessels.

All of this gave Article 5 teeth.

When the Cold War ended in 1990-91, this combat-ready military force was gradually dismantled. Now, if there were to be a conventional fight in Europe, the Russian military is much stronger. It would defeat any force NATO could assemble.

Today the ability to deter a potential adversary from considering military action against a NATO member is no longer a certainty. That means the notion of NATO providing European collective self-defense is questionable.

In the past, NATO planned on countering the Soviet Union’s weapons and manpower superiority with tactical nuclear weapons. But The Heritage Foundation says that we can’t do that because there’s an imbalance in our nuclear arsenals:

“While the US and Russia have a similar number of deployed strategic (i.e., high-yield) nuclear weapons as limited under New START, Russia has a 10:1 advantage over us in nonstrategic (i.e., low-yield) nuclear weapons—aka tactical or battlefield nukes.”

They report that Russia has about 2,000 nonstrategic nuclear weapons, while the US has about 200. Half of them are in the US and half are with NATO, so we have about 100 tactical nukes on the ground in Europe. You might say no one is ever going to use nukes in Europe, but on Wednesday Putin warned: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“Anyone who tries to interfere with us, or even more so, to create threats for our country and our people, must know that Russia’s response will be immediate and will lead you to such consequences as you have never before experienced in your history.”

Putin’s threat could mean anything from cyber-attacks to nuclear war. But Global Security Review reports that the current edition of Russian military doctrine says that Russia:

“…reserves the right to use nuclear weapons to respond to all weapons of mass destruction attacks…on Russia and its allies.”

That significantly lowers the threshold for the use of nuclear weapons. The idea is Russia might employ tactical nuclear weapons during a conventional conflict with NATO forces to prevent a defeat, to consolidate gains, or to freeze a conflict in place without further fighting. The last two could happen in Ukraine.

Given that the disparity between Russian and European tactical nuclear weapons is so large, Moscow probably thinks any potential NATO nuclear response to their threat of using nukes isn’t credible.

This means NATO today can no longer stave off a Russian threat in Europe without using strategic nuclear weapons, a major escalation. That would be a very unlikely scenario if Russia is taking small bites of Western territory, as in Ukraine:

(hat tip, Monty B.)

Since World War II, the US has reserved the right to the “first use” of nuclear weapons should the need arise. But in January, several Democrats urged Biden to promulgate a “no-first-use” policy for US nuclear weapons. Eleven Senators and 44 House members signed a letter urging Biden to accept the policy. Imagine the consequences if a policy of no-first-use was in place, given what’s happening in Ukraine. Or what might happen if the fight was with a NATO member.

We’re now in a place where the West either accepts Russia’s new European order, or we gear up to make them recalculate Putin’s strategy.

If we choose to oppose the new Russian order, the US and Europe will incur costs. It will hurt our economies, since while sanctions will hurt the Russians, we’re hoping they will not hurt us as much, or more. Russian cyber-attacks may seriously hurt our infrastructure. The West will be forced to provide large levels of military and humanitarian support to a damaged and smaller Ukraine, possibly for years.

We will see increased defense spending. Our military will once again be deployed to Europe where they will serve as a tripwire against Russian aggression like they did in the Cold War.

This will require a unified NATO to work together for many years. Is that a realistic plan, given that different US presidents, like Trump, may not support the goals of this new NATO?

We’re in a different world now. This war will almost certainly be transformative for Europe and the world. The full effects of Russia’s attack on Ukraine will play out not just for years, but for decades.

Let’s close with the Beatles “Back in the USSR”:

Lyrics:

Well the Ukraine girls really knock me out,
They leave the West behind
And Moscow girls make me sing and shout
That Georgia’s always on my mind

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Biden Must Take the Gloves Off

The Daily Escape:

Delicate Arch, Arches NP – 2022 photo by Nannette White

(The hosting service for the Wrongologist continues to have intermittent problems with the RSS feed that sends subscribers an email version of the column in the morning. Please go to the website to see earlier columns.)

The tense standoff between Ukraine and Russia took an ominous turn towards war when, as Wrongo forecasted on Feb 14, Putin recognized the independence of the two breakaway eastern Ukraine provinces:

“Wrongo has no crystal ball but thinks that Russia will formally recognize Ukraine’s disputed Eastern provinces of Donetsk and Luhansk as independent states….But Ukraine doesn’t recognize these provinces as independent….Ukraine could be lured into trying to regain control of both provinces. At that point Russia would help defend them against Ukraine, most likely assuring that they would remain independent, although still technically part of Ukraine.”

Putin also said that he was ordering “peace-keepers” into both provinces. That effectively blunts most military responses that Ukraine might attempt.

One way to look at the situation is that Putin didn’t “invade” Ukraine. Instead, using this pretext, Russia is prepared to fight on behalf of two independent Republics who asked for Putin’s help. By recognizing Donetsk and Luhansk, Putin is following the model of how Western nations handled the 1990s breakup of Yugoslavia into three separate republics, ending communist rule in the nation.

This is a watershed moment for European security. Russia has dared Ukraine and the West to attack the breakaway provinces in the face of Russia defending them. The absolutely central question is: What aid and comfort are NATO and the US going to give Ukraine?

Biden has announced what he called the “first tranche” of sanctions on Russia, targeting two Russian banks, VEB and Russia’s military bank, along with the country’s sovereign debt. That means Russia can no longer raise money from the West and will not be able to trade its debt in US or European markets.

Biden also said sanctions on Russian elites and their families members would be rolled out starting tomorrow.

Wrongo doubts that Russia will move significant numbers of its forces into the two “independent” regions unless Ukraine attempts to re-occupy them. If Ukraine does that, it’s likely that a general war between Ukraine and Russia will begin.

Americans (specifically Republican chicken hawks) should remember that eastern Ukraine is very remote in logistical terms. Even if the US wanted to help defend Ukraine’s east, the logistics of movement and supply would be absurdly difficult.

We should immediately implement our strongest sanctions. Biden shouldn’t meet with Putin, although Blinken and Lavrov should meet. Diplomacy should determine if recognition of Donetsk and Luhansk is what Putin will settle for. If so, the task is to see if Ukraine would be fine with that. If both agree, so should the West and the US.

One thing NATO could do is close the Bosphorus, the narrow straits between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean Sea. NATO member Turkey controls access to the Bosphorus under a 1936 treaty called the Montreux Convention. In wartime, Turkey is authorized to close the straits to all foreign warships. It can also refuse transit for merchant ships from countries at war.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan recently has emphasized his support for Ukraine. Erdogan has said Turkey will do what is necessary as a NATO ally if Russia invades, without elaborating. But Turkey is also reliant on Russia for energy and tourism. It has forged close cooperation with Moscow on energy and defense, even deploying Russia’s S-400 missile air defense system.

Imagine the pressure on Putin if Russia couldn’t send warships or merchant ships through the Bosphorus so long as the Ukraine crisis is hot.

In effect, Ukraine lost its Eastern territories along with Crimea, eight years ago. If Russian forces now start patrolling the line of contact with the new “Republics”, that will probably end the shooting. People on both sides of the border could then get back to a more normal life.

It would still leave an unstable Eastern Front for NATO and an unstable Western Front for Russia. That is something diplomacy could work on solving. Russia would have to deal with a Western-facing Ukraine integrating even more deeply into the EU. NATO would remain in Eastern Europe from the Baltics to the Balkans. NATO would then have a true mission, rather than floundering around without purpose.

Putin won’t be totally happy with this. But right now, he isn’t getting his demands met, even though he has more than half of his army on the Ukrainian border.

Let’s close with a tune. Here’s 1974’s “You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet” from Bachman Turner Overdrive, because in Ukraine, you ain’t seen nothing yet:

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Monday Wake Up Call – February 21, 2022

The Daily Escape:

Sunrise, Head of the Meadow Beach, Truro, MA – February 2022 photo by Maia Gomory Germain

Today is Presidents Day. Originally we celebrated George Washington’s birthday on February 22, until it was moved to the third Monday in February in 1971. It later morphed into Presidents Day (with no apostrophe).

Each year, in honor of Washington, a US Senator reads Washington’s farewell address. The political Parties alternate in the reading. Last year, Republican Rob Portman of Ohio read the address. This year, Democrat Patrick Leahy of Vermont has the honor. He’ll do the reading on Feb. 28.

This part of Washington’s farewell address remains relevant today: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries which result gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction…turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of public liberty.”

Words to live by.

Here’s another view on the Ukraine crisis. Foreign Affairs has an article, “What if Russia Wins?” The assumption in the US media is that Putin has little to gain by invading. Wrongo has said as much. But the Foreign Affairs article says that if Putin succeeds, he stands to gain a lot by weakening NATO and also the US.

The authors remind us that in 2015, after Russia joined the Syrian civil war, then-President Obama said that Syria would become a “quagmire”, that Syria would be Russia’s Vietnam or Putin’s Afghanistan, a mistake that would cost Russia dearly.

Syria wasn’t a quagmire for Putin. Russia changed the course of the civil war. It then translated its military force into diplomatic leverage. Russia kept its costs and casualties sustainable, and today, it can’t be ignored in the Middle East.

Obama failed to anticipate the possibility that Russia’s intervention would succeed.

Once again, most analysts are warning of dire consequences for Russia if they invade. All of our cost-benefit analyses say that the price of full-scale war in Ukraine would be very high, including significant bloodshed. The thinking is that war and the escalation of western sanctions would undermine Putin’s support among the Russian elite, endanger Russia’s economy and alienate the Russian public.

At the same time, it could leave Russia fighting a Ukrainian resistance for years. According to this view, Russia would be trapped in a disaster of its own making.

So why would Russia invade now? From Foreign Affairs:

“Putin’s cost-benefit analysis seems to favor upending the European status quo. The Russian leadership is taking on more risks…Putin is on a historic mission to solidify Russia’s leverage in Ukraine (as he has recently in Belarus and Kazakhstan). And as Moscow sees it, a victory in Ukraine might well be within reach.”

Russia could just continue the current crisis without invading, but if Putin’s calculus is right, as it was in Syria, then the US and Europe need to think through that eventuality. Putin may conclude that political dissension in America gives him a decided advantage, along with an opportunity to remake the map in Eastern Europe, where Ukraine is second only to Russia in size.

If Russia gains control of Ukraine, Western Europe and the US enter a new geopolitical era. They’d face the challenge of rethinking European security while trying to avoid being drawn into a war with Russia. Overhanging that is the possibility of nuclear-armed adversaries in direct confrontation.

The two goals of a robust defense of Europe, but one that also avoids military escalation with Russia, aren’t fully compatible. The US could wake up to find ourselves unprepared for the task of having to create a new European security order after Russia controls Ukraine.

Invading Ukraine would also put enormous pressure on American democracy and national cohesion. Biden would go into the midterms with two extraordinarily difficult-to-justify foreign policy disasters — the Afghanistan withdrawal and Putin’s win in Ukraine.

Biden’s defenders would argue that both had complex causes and weren’t really solely Biden’s doing. But what the average American would see, even before the eventual Republican chicken hawk posturing, will be that America’s diminished effectiveness and power occurred on Biden’s watch. Biden will be blamed, and Putin might then help get his old buddy, the easily manipulated, NATO-hating Trump, back in power.

If Putin succeeds, the potential consequences in the US are great, and they would be a boon to Russia.

Time to wake up America! If/when the sanctions don’t work, we’re probably bringing back the Cold War under a new Republican administration. To help you wake up, watch Playing For Change’s cover of Led Zeppelin’s “When the Levee Breaks”, about the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927, the most destructive river flooding in US history.

Here, original band member John Paul Jones is accompanied by Stephen Perkins of Jane’s Addiction, Susan Tedeschi, Derek Trucks and 20 other musicians from seven different countries:

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Saturday Soother – February 19, 2022

The Daily Escape:

South Dakota Badlands- September 2021 photo by Mark Campbell

Wrongo had to take time off after cataract surgery, and unable to read (or type on the pc), he spent some time watching the Beijing Winter Olympics. The achievements and failures of three women stand out.

First, 19 year-old Eileen Gu, the San Francisco-born free skiing phenom who competes for China, won three medals, two of which were gold. She has been the subject of fascination in Beijing because she is able to cross the competing cultures of the US and China. That also brought questions about whether she has dual citizenship. But she withstood the glare, and won three medals and adoration from China’s state-run media.

Second, Mikaela Shiffrin, the American skier who was favored to win gold in Beijing and failed to medal. On Thursday, she crashed in the Alpine combined, ending her last chance for an individual medal at these Games. In downhill training before the Alpine combined, Shiffrin had the fastest run of the 14 skiers who started, but she couldn’t maintain it during the actual event. Shiffrin already has three Olympic medals, plus she has six world championships to her credit.

Finally, Russian skater Kamila Valiera had the most controversial Olympics of any athlete. She started with placing first in a fantastic short program. Later, we heard about her positive doping test. Then, the Olympic Committee allowed her to skate anyway, while saying there would be no medal ceremony if she won. Finally, she failed to medal in an event where she was heavily favored.

Her story tells us how terrible the Olympics have become. Remember when you were 15? Remember all of the angst that came with being that age? Now try to imagine dealing with it in front of the press. Imagine millions of people watching what are likely your most painful moments.

The moment that the Olympic Committee learned Valiera tested positive for a banned substance, she should have been disqualified from the competition. It wasn’t fair to her competitors, and the increased spotlight wasn’t fair to her.

Her long program and the aftermath was brutal to watch. She looked like a broken person. And the worst thing about this was that the Russian coaches who were in charge of her well-being failed her spectacularly.

There’s plenty of blame to go around: The Russian Olympic Committee for its systemic, state-sponsored doping of Olympic athletes. The Court of Arbitration for Sport that allowed her to skate after the International Olympic Committee wanted her disqualified. You can blame her coach, Eteri Tutberidze, who instead of comforting a young woman in distress after her poor performance, berated her.

In an era where there’s a new emphasis on the mental health of athletes, no adult on the Russian Olympic Committee looked out for her. One thing is certain, this fifteen-year-old girl needed support and empathy. Both were in short supply in Beijing.

It’s another example of the abuse of young women in sports competition. Another question is when publicity plus crushing expectations makes people like Mikaela Shiffrin, Simone Biles or Kamila Valiera emotionally crater on the biggest stage, what should the public’s response be?

Society isn’t great at recognizing the humanity of women in elite sports, where one momentary slip can undo a lifetime of work. That’s assuming we define their work by what happens when people tune into the Olympics every four years.

We’re obsessed with the “busts” and those who “cheat” or “choke”. The sports world establishment has until very recently, not fully appreciated the strains that top female athletes face. It also has failed on many occasions to provide the support systems they need. That pressure is greater for Olympic athletes. The spotlight is brighter if you point towards a competition once every four years that defines your career.

Shame on you Russia!

That’s enough about what’s wrong for this week. It’s cold again in Connecticut, although it’s mostly what’s normal for February. It’s time once again for our Saturday Soother, where we forget about the impending death of mask mandates, or threats to Ukraine, or trying to understand why Kamala Harris is in Germany meeting with NATO.

First, let’s brew up a vente cup of Josh Josh coffee ($18.75/12 oz.) from Colorado Springs, CO’s Model Citizen Coffee Company. The roaster says it’s the perfect cup for a lazy Saturday morning.

Now grab a seat by a window and listen to organist Jonathan Scott perform his solo organ arrangement of the Radetzky March Op. 228 by Johann Strauss on the organ of The Bridgewater Hall, Manchester, UK. It was first performed in August 1848:

Watch Scott use his left hand and right hand at the same time he’s using both of his feet. Doesn’t seem possible to this untrained person.

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Monday Wake Up Call – February 14, 2022

The Daily Escape:

Red barn, white snow, in Spatford, NY – 2022 photo by Michael Erb

In last night’s Superb Owl, the LA Rams won. Your guacamole was probably better than the commercials.

Today is Valentine’s Day, a marketing triumph for the greeting card industry. There are no other triumphs to celebrate this morning, so let’s talk about a less than triumphal situation: Is something big about to happen in Ukraine?

Biden says America won’t fight for Ukraine; that would lead to “a world war.” Putin reads that as saying he’s got a free hand there assuming that he’s willing to take on whatever pain the West’s sanctions bring. Assuming Russia has economic support from China, Russia will probably be able to cope with the strain of new sanctions.

Wrongo has no crystal ball but thinks that Russia will formally recognize Ukraine’s disputed Eastern provinces of Donetsk and Luhansk as independent states. Today, Russia acts as if they are a part of the Russian Federation. The people living in these ethnically Russian provinces already speak Russian and carry Russian passports.

But Ukraine doesn’t recognize these provinces as independent. That has been a stumbling block in the current negotiations between France, Germany Russia, and Ukraine around what were formerly known as the Minsk accords, agreed in 2015, but never implemented.

Ukraine could be lured into trying to regain control of both provinces. At that point Russia would help defend them against Ukraine, most likely assuring that they would remain independent, although still technically part of Ukraine. That would be a huge win for Putin since its long been clear that NATO will not accept any new member that has a substantial Russian population.

That would achieve what Putin wants without the US having to put it in the form of a written guarantee.

Finally, it is hard to believe that Russia really wants to become responsible for the economic basket case called Ukraine. Here’s a comparison by Adam Tooze, of Ukraine’s GDP per capita compared to Russia, Poland, and Turkey:

From Tooze: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“Ukraine’s performance between 1990 and 2017 was not just worse than its European neighbors. It was the fifth worst in the entire world. Between 1990 and 2017 there were…only 18 countries with negative cumulative growth and…Ukraine’s performance puts it in the bottom third…. amongst the four countries that delivered less growth for their citizens than Ukraine were the Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi and Yemen.”

Why are things so terrible in Ukraine? It’s due to corruption, demographic decline, and lack of investment in most industry sectors.

Disputes are negotiated when each side can call it a “win”. It’s obvious that an invasion of Ukraine would not be a win for Putin, so what he’s doing now seems more like a negotiating tactic. If he declares these two breakaway provinces to be an independent part of Russia, look for Belarus to be next.

Since the US and NATO have put up such a big stink, Russia probably won’t try to overthrow the government in Kyiv. OTOH, Putin doesn’t want to be seen as losing in this standoff over Ukraine, so recognizing the disputed provinces is an available middle ground.

And the US has already tacitly agreed to this once before when Russia annexed Crimea.

A Morning Consult Poll — done on February 7th that sampled 2,005 registered US voters showed that if there was a complete Russian occupation of Ukraine, then 42% of Americans support sending in troops. That’s a plurality, but not a majority.

The Morning Consult found a different response in Europe. Respondents in France (31%), Germany (37%) and the UK (37%) support the primary sanction, closing the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. Interestingly, in Germany, another 37% also opposed closing the pipeline if Russia invades.

So viewpoints are more nuanced the closer you get to the front lines.

Time to wake up America! Ukraine isn’t core to US strategy in Europe or in NATO. Yes, Ukraine’s right of self-determination is at stake. But given the GDP rankings above, you could say it’s already a failed state. And what about US support in other low income countries looks like the ticket out of failed state status for Ukraine?

To help you wake up, listen to Billy Bragg perform “Ten Mysterious Photos That Can’t Be Explained” from his 2021 album “The Million Things That Never Happened”.

Sample Lyrics:

I’ve been down rabbit holes
I’ve seen the rabid trolls
Cackling in the twilight
Of the Age of Reason
One thing I’ve noticed
As I get older
Common sense like art
Is in the eye of the beholder

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Saturday Soother – Super Bowl Edition, February 12, 2022

The Daily Escape:

Owens River, east of Big Pine, CA – 2022 photo by Brian Joliffe

Tomorrow brings the Super Bowl, an American cultural icon that transcends football. Even people who don’t watch football watch the Super Bowl. Advertising executives know that it is the one time each year when most Americans are tuned into one show at the same time, across most forms of media.

It’s watched by roughly 100 million viewers. Given the fragmentation of our media, it’s a huge number of eyeballs to find in one place. That’s why Super Bowl commercials cost so much. NBC, broadcaster of this year’s game, sold out all of its Super Bowl ad space for $7 million per 30 second spot.

And though it may only last for a short time, this is the first time in 22 years that the Super Bowl will be played when the country is not officially at war.

On Sunday, the Super Bowl halftime show will be a celebration of hip hop, featuring Los Angeles rap heroes Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, and Kendrick Lamar. That places hip hop firmly at the center of the Super Bowl for the first time. The show will also star Eminem and Mary J. Blige.

Depending on who you ask, that’s either one of the greatest classic hip-hop lineups ever assembled, or way too much lineup for a show that only lasts for about 13 minutes, less than 3 minutes per artist.

This isn’t the first time the Super Bowl has included rap music. But it’s had a rocky path to headliner status. Headlining this year’s event comes at a time when the NFL is again confronting issues regarding its tin ear about race.

Since 2016, when the quarterback Colin Kaepernick began kneeling during the national anthem to protest police killings of Black people, the league has faced questions about its commitment to diversity and social justice. Brian Flores, a Black NFL head coach who was fired last month, sued the league, claiming he and others had been discriminated against during various teams’ hiring processes.

This year, Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg are taking the NFL in a different direction, and that may be the idea. The NYT quotes Will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas, who headlined the show in 2011:

“At one point, Dre was in a group that was banned by popular culture,”

Will.i.am is referring to Dr. Dre’s gangster rap group NWA, widely considered in the late 1980s to be one of the greatest and most influential groups in the history of hip hop music. Their music had explicit lyrics, and many viewed NWA as misogynistic. They also glorified drugs and crime.

Their work was banned from many mainstream American radio stations. In spite of this, the group has sold over 10 million albums in the US. Wrongo’s favorite NWA cut is “Fuck Tha Police” from their 1988 album “Straight Outta Compton”. You should take a listen, but don’t hate on Wrongo if you despise it.

That the NFL has now turned to these formerly controversial figures, makes it seem as if we’ve moved far from White America’s pearl-clutching days of Janet Jackson’s 2004 wardrobe malfunction. Or from M.I.A.’s middle finger in 2012, or Beyoncé’s nod to the Black Panthers in 2016.

Or maybe we haven’t moved on. But right now, the league needs to embrace Black music and culture to help shore up its badly damaged community bona fides.

And there’s the open secret: The NFL, a fabulously wealthy sports league whose least valuable team is worth more than $2 billion, doesn’t pay its Super Bowl performers. They consider their halftime show to be music’s ultimate for-exposure gig. But how much is that exposure worth when multiple performers are competing for just 13 minutes of attention?

On to our Saturday Soother. Weather is positively spring-like in Connecticut, so Wrongo will venture outside for some way-too-early spring cleanup. After that we have a family party followed by making turkey chili and queso con chorizo for Sunday’s extravaganza.

It’s time for you to forget about Trump’s missing call logs from Jan. 6, and grab a seat by a window. Now, plug in your Bluetooth headphones and listen to John Williams, who turned 90 this week. Here’s his “Cowboys Overture” from the 1972 film, “The Cowboys” starring John Wayne.

It’s played live in 2020 by the Film Symphony Orchestra, Spain’s first orchestra specializing in cinematic music:

While you listen, to this mythical view of the west, do you hear echoes of Aaron Copeland?

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Monday Wake Up Call – Ukraine Edition, February 7, 2022

The Daily Escape:

Winter in the Palouse, near the town of Oakesdale, WA – January 2022 photo by James Richmond Photography

We talk a lot about a nation’s credibility in foreign policy. The US strives to be credible regarding its positions with allies and foes alike. We have often failed. Russia has also proven many times over that it isn’t a credible partner.

Consider a report from Numbers Stations showing that Russia has invaded its neighbors and a couple of distant countries 58 times since 1917. One element of clear credibility for Russia is its willingness to invade others. How does knowing this history inform the current situation between Russia and Ukraine?

The world is well-aware of Russia’s ostentatious military buildup along Ukraine’s border. Putin added to the tensions by making demands requiring a new European security order. He wants Russia to be allowed its own sphere of influence that roughly corresponds to the old Soviet Union. That means NATO should certainly not expand, and possibly should contract.

Let’s look at history between the US and Ukraine:

  • In 1994, President Clinton asked Ukraine to give up its nuclear weapons. In return, Ukraine got a financial settlement and the Budapest Memorandum which provided non-aggression assurances by both the US and Russia. Ukraine shipped 1700 or so nuclear warheads back to Russia and destroyed the missiles.
  • In 2014, President Obama looked at the big, muddy land called Ukraine and asked if its strategic importance was worth war. Meaning a real war, with an enemy that could fight back. He decided on economic sanctions.
  • In 2020, President Trump attempted to blackmail the Ukrainian president into interfering on his behalf in an American election.
  • In 2022, President Biden rules out military intervention should Russia invade Ukraine, talking mostly about more economic sanctions as the consequence.

Regardless of whether Russia invades Ukraine or not, the US is walking down a perilous path. It faces efforts to divide and neutralize its alliances in both Europe and Asia.

In Europe, Russia wants to bury the post-Cold War order. Putin wants Europe to recognize its sphere of influence in the former Soviet countries. Putin wants to separate Ukraine from NATO permanently. He would like to fracture the European alliance by making Germany a more neutral party as Russia attempts to create its western buffer zone.

Europeans think that Putin won’t invade but will follow a hybrid strategy — keeping a military presence on the border, continuing weaponization of Russia’s European energy supply and increased cyberattacks — which will serve to keep NATO from becoming fully anti-Russian the way an invasion of Ukraine would. From the NYT:

“Before the crisis, Germany was America’s closest ally in Europe, boasted a special relationship with Moscow and was the most important partner for Eastern and Central Europe. Today…Berlin’s relationship with Moscow is fast deteriorating….Germany’s difficulties are a hint of what could come if Mr. Putin continues his brinkmanship, without providing the certainty of an actual invasion.”

The US and Germany aren’t singing from the same choir book right now, so Putin may be on to something.

In Asia, China would like to drive a wedge between the US and some of its Eastern allies. It already has agreed with Russia on the demand for NATO to pull back in Europe.

India tilted toward Russia at the UN Security Council meetings last week. After China and Russia cast “no” votes in the Security Council on whether to hold an official session to discuss the Ukraine crisis, Responsible Statecraft says that India abstained. It was effectively a rejection of the US attempt to hold Russia accountable.

In the Philippines, the front-runner for president says he wouldn’t accept any offer of help from the US in negotiations with China over the South China Sea if elected president in May.

Any person can see what’s coming in cold war 2.0 and should be very wary and worried. We need to learn to navigate in what has become a multi-polar world, one with worthy competitors in Russia and China.

We should remember that during cold war 1.0 in 1962, the stationing of Russian missiles in Cuba let to a great power deal. Russia took its missiles out of Cuba and the US pulled its missiles from Turkey and Italy. Back then, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev was willing to consider Kennedy’s fears about Moscow’s missile deployment in Cuba. That became the basis for ending the confrontation.

The enormity of how close the world came to thermonuclear war led to an easing of tensions.  The next 50 years were a period of relative calm in US/Russian relations.

Today’s warlike tensions between the US and Russia over Ukraine have most of the same elements present, with the roles reversed. Now, Putin is telling the West that Ukraine should not be allowed to join NATO. He also demands that the US should not place offensive weapons in Ukraine.

Like Cuba in 1962, is Ukraine now the chessboard for these superpowers? Is there a lesson here from that history?

Time to wake up America! You aren’t uniquely qualified to run the world, and there are competitors who will work really hard to prevent you from trying to continue doing so. To help you wake up, listen to Pink Floyd perform “Dogs Of War” from their album “Delicate Sound Of Thunder” at the Nassau Coliseum, NY in 1988. While the singing is a bit muffled, the band sounds fine, and there’s a great saxophone solo by Scott Paige:

Sample Lyric:

Invisible transfers and long distance calls
Hollow laughter in marble halls
Steps have been taken, a silent uproar
Has unleashed the dogs of war
You can’t stop what has begun
Signed, sealed, they deliver oblivion

The dogs of war won’t negotiate
The dogs of war don’t capitulate

Still relevant, 34 years later!

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Saturday Soother – February 5, 2022

The Daily Escape:

Paradise Springs, South Kettle Moraine, Eagle, WI – January 2022 photo by Nick Schroeter. The spring water is warm enough that it doesn’t freeze in winter

This week two years ago, Covid began to enter America’s consciousness. It was February 3, 2020 when Trump declared a public health emergency because of the virus. Now, Republicans are again saying “let ‘er rip”. Mother Jones reported that Iowa is taking “done with Covid” to a whole new level. On Thursday, Iowa’s Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds announced a plan to end the state’s Covid disaster declaration and to shut down its case count and vaccination websites later this month.

From the Des Moines Register:

“We cannot continue to suspend duly enacted laws and treat COVID-19 as a public health emergency indefinitely,” Reynolds said in a statement. “After two years, it’s no longer feasible or necessary. The flu and other infectious illnesses are part of our everyday lives, and coronavirus can be managed similarly.”

In a state with less than two-thirds of the population over 5 years old fully vaccinated, Wrongo asks what kind of governor and legislature shuts down a website aimed at making it easier for people to get their shots? If the last year has taught us anything, it’s that it is in the people’s best interest to make it as easy as possible to vaccinate as many people as possible.

The Register adds:

“Her move comes as Iowa’s spike in cases and hospitalizations from the omicron variant has begun to ease. Still, 794 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 in Iowa as of Wednesday, while 109 patients required intensive care and 51 required ventilators.”

BTW, 70.6% of the patients in Iowa ICUs were not vaccinated. Having contemporaneous data allows us to see that Iowa recorded more than 150 additional COVID-19 deaths in its weekly update last Friday. In the same report, Iowa’s health department recorded just three additional flu deaths in its weekly flu report Jan. 28, bringing the total since last fall to just 13.

The data do not seem to make a case to treat Covid and the flu the same way.

The governor’s decision to end the emergency declaration may be more sensible. Many states have already discontinued theirs. And as Omicron case counts plummet, maybe there’s a chance to reallocate resources to other state priorities.

Today you can check Iowa’s status on its readable and useful Covid dashboard. That dashboard will now be going away.

Soon, the state health department’s website will not include regular reports on Covid hospitalizations or nursing home outbreaks. Kelly Garcia, interim director of the Iowa Department of Public Health, said Iowa will no longer require hospitals and nursing homes to report the data to the state, since they already report it to the federal government. Iowans wanting updates on those numbers will be referred to federal websites.

Lina Tucker Reinders, executive director of the Iowa Public Health Association, said in an interview that the move was premature, and could give Iowans the false impression the pandemic is over.

Iowa’s own statistics show that isn’t the case.

It’s become an article of faith inside the Republican cult that Covid is No Big Deal, and that vaccinations are either unnecessary or some sort of plot. And that masks are also unnecessary, because Covid is just like the flu.

Across the country, these same Republicans are seeing the elderly in their families, neighborhoods and churches die of Covid while a free and effective vaccine is available. But they don’t care enough to make getting themselves vaccinated a priority.

If they don’t care about their elders, why would they care about nurses, or teachers? That would require disrupting their entire worldview.

No scientist says that the virus is finished mutating. So will treating it like the flu be good enough? If it isn’t, Gov. Reynolds certainly won’t give a shit.

Time to let go for a few minutes and relocate to a chair by a window for our Saturday Soother.

It will be another winter weekend of indoor sports in New England, with binge streaming of favorite shows on tap, along with chiseling ice on the walkways around the Mansion of Wrong.

Let’s start into the weekend by brewing up a large mug of Chutzpah Coffee ($13.99/ 12oz.) brought to us by Hebrew Coffee. Their tag line is “A strong coffee to get you off your tuches”. Now settle into your chair and watch “Pow Surf 101”, a long snowboard ride through deep powder, while listening to Claude Debussy’s “Claire de Lune”, written in 1890 when Debussy was 28. The snowboarding takes place in Steamboat Springs, CO. Consider this Wrongo’s nod to the Winter Olympics:

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